1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the art of divided cell cartons, particularly egg cartons, which spring bias articles firmly into the cells. Specifically this invention relates to molded plastic egg cartons having a tray with a plurality of rows of open top side-by-side egg-shaped cells with a lid hinged to the tray having depending straps defining pairs of connected spring fingers positioned to resiliently bias articles in adjacent cells toward the bottoms and sides of the cells and thereby extend the use of the carton to house eggs of different sizes.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Heretofore, cellular egg cartons had to be provided for each egg size range. Generally, such cartons were made with cell sizes accommodating both small and medium size eggs or large and extra large jumbo size eggs. When small eggs are packaged in a carton having cells large enough to accommodate medium size eggs and when large eggs are packaged in a carton designed to also receive extra large jumbo eggs, the small and large eggs will fit very loosely in their respective cartons, increasing the probability of breakage. Further, since eggs within a particular lot size can vary greatly in size and shape, even those cartons which were specifically designed for a particular lot size have failed to snuggly package all eggs within that lot size.
It would therefor be an improvement in this art to provide a divided cell carton, such as an egg carton with spring straps which bias a pair of articles in adjacent cells into firm nested engagement with the bottom and side walls of their cells. It would be a further specific improvement in this art to provide the straps with resilient hair pin spring bridge connections between fingers engaging the articles.